Any similarity between the opinions posted on the SDMB and those of the general public is purely coincidental.
Not dissent by Canadians! STFU. 
I think near-universal hatred might be a bit of a hurdle to doing the job. Q.v. Ceauşescu, Premadasa, Amin, etc.
People in Cameroon have little idea. Almost daily somebody comes up to me and says the Democrats cannot possible win because a women or black person cannot possibly be President of the United States. When I assert that it seems pretty likely that the Democrats would win because everyone hates Bush, they just snicker and laugh and tell me I am wrong.
I wish I could hear a little more love here for the Americans who voted against Bush. We acknowledge that he is our president too, and I can’t see why his 8 years wouldn’t count in the world opinion. But, there are roughly as many Americans who voted against Bush as the total number of people in Spain, or in Italy, or in Poland. I’m one of them, and feel like I’ve been accidentally caught in this silly cowboy’s disastrous joyride.
What are we supposed to do? I voted! I gave donations! I printed out articles and bought books to give people! I made the kids promise to vote!
There is a large number of us, and it’s hardly our fault that there is a similarly large number of people whose actions absolutely baffle and amaze us.
I think I’m ready now for the USA to split into Jesusland and New New England.
That’s only true until The Revolution™©.
One popular misconception in America and probably abroad is that due to the red/blue 2004 election maps Bush is beloved in the south and most of the west while he’s abhorred in New England and the Pacific Coast and northern midwest. A more accurate map is the Purple America map showing that he had considerable support in some traditionally liberal states and considerable opposition in some traditionally conservative states. My own state, Alabama, is traditionally very conservative, but there is a blue line across the middle of the state that went Democrat in 04 (in spite of how despised John Kerry was); with the support of Obama by a large number of whites and a vast majority of blacks there’s a chance we’ll go Demo for the first time in many decades. (Alabama is 27% black, but historically fewer black voters turn out than white voters [by percentage as a group], but if Obama is nominated then there’s potentially several hundred thousand more black voters to go to the polls than in most elections which when added to the large minority of white Democrats could help considerably.)
This is a bit misleading, since a group almost always gets more polarized opinions than a single individual.
If you look at the polls for individual Congresspersons, you will see most of them much higher. Often from the same people: they will say Congress is lazy & corrupt – except for my Congressman, he’s wonderful.
All I know is that when I met Norwegian, of all things, in Izmir last fall we chatted about governments. When I asked about the duties of the King of Norway he said they were largely ceremonial, head of the church of Norway, Order of this, Commander of that, attend the funereals of foreign heads of state and such, he seemed surprised to see how much I looked forward to seeing him visit the United States.
I was trying to explain my take on it in my comments at post 42, as an outsider to your system. Does what I said match what you’re thinking?
Yup. I was hating Bush before it cool.
I agree with you on that one,speaking as a Limey, Nixon was corrupt,unethical and appeared to have had a charisma by pass operation.
But he was bloody good at the job.
Amongst other things he got Detente with the Russians,got China talking to the U.S. after years of silence and solved his own Cuban Missile Crisis with the minimum of fuss.
But Carter IMO one of the most honest POTUSs in modern times was pretty much a disaster as a Global negotiator.
So I’m not opining nice is good and nasty is bad.
I was in Florida on the run up to the election of Dubya and asked an American mate who owned a small software company who he was going to vote for.
Bush.
But the mans a total dummy and greedy as well.
Ah yes he said I totally agree but he’s going to put Bucks on my Bank Balance and its money before sentiment when it all comes down to it.
Cynical but honest.
Not that this contradicts anything written here, but Bush is wildly popular with about half of all Republican voters. Even today, 72% of all Republicans approve of the way that he is handling his job.
During the Republican primaries, I saw little evidence that any of them were running away from George Bushism. John McCain bent over backwards to say how much he loved budget-busting tax cuts: he has no coherent deficit cutting plan. And if anything he is more hawkish on Iraq than George Bush is.
On the plus side, fewer and fewer Americans are identifying themselves as Republicans. Still, I wish that the Democrats had a better quality opposition.
Who was president when the United States invaded Serbia? What was the reason?
Wilson was President during World War I. Roosevelt was President during World War II.
Clinton, with NATO backing, bombed Serbia during the Kosovo War: he did not invade however as technically no ground troops were involved.
Serbia was part of the Austria-Hungarian empire, which made it a battlefield during World War I. For some reason, America sided with democracies such as France and the UK during that conflict.
The Nazis occupied Yugoslavia during World War II. The red army and allied armies met there in 1945. For some reason, the US sided with the democratic United Kingdom during that conflict.
NATO and the US bombed Serbia during the Kosovo war to prevent genocide. General Wesley Clark discusses how coalitions fight wars in Waging Modern War, a tome deliberately dismissed by Vice President Cheney and the Bush Administration.
I believe that is incorrect: Serbia was an independent country during World War I, and it was in fact the Austro-Hungarian declaration of war on Serbia that pushed all their respective allies in a war against each other and started the Great War.
I can’t help but wonder if the Democrats would put up a black person or a woman if they believed they were up against a tough opposition 
We have troops over there right now.
Hussein did the same thing to the Kurds and Shiites who rebelled in Iraq. Not to mention the previous wars on his neighbors that killed millions and threatened the world’s energy supply. He also tried to assassinate a world leader, which, as has been pointed out, was the beginning of WWI. Stopping Hussein’s attacks on his own people was one of many reasons given for invading Iraq.
Nevertheless, his crimes, and crimes they are, are far more heinous than perjury. Remember that impeachment is a political, not a judicial, process, and for these purposes “high crimes and misdemeanors” are whatever Congress wants them to be; the criminal law has only tangential relevance. (The impeachment of Andrew Johson on very nebulous charges may have been unwise, but I’ve never heard a serious argument that it was unconstitutional.)
I started a thread before the last election, asking how it was possible that Bush was about to win again. I based this on the fact that Dave Letterman was nightly mocking the Democrats. I could not believe that sentient beings would give GWB another term so I am forever dubious about what the US electorate think, or will do, about anything.